it's theater

Go man!

The value of the civics lesson alone is worth it...and even if the whole thing ends up amounting to nothing more than face time for Obama, even that has it's benefits...

My long term concern, however, is politics as spectacle diluting the focus of the politics even further and turning the whole process into nothing more than daytime television...although it may be entertaining, an endless season of Survivor episodes is not the way to run Government, IMO...

is a live feed from the healthcare conference

Poll shows concern about American influence waning as China's grows

Source: Washington Post

Facing high unemployment and a difficult economy, most Americans think the United States will have a smaller role in the world economy in the coming years, and many believe that while the 20th century may have been the "American Century," the 21st century will belong to China.

These results come from a new Washington Post-ABC News poll conducted during a time of significant tension between Washington and Beijing.

"China's on the rise," said Wayne Nunnery, 56, a retired U.S. Air Force employee from Bexar, Tex., who was one of 1,004 randomly selected adults polled. "I don't worry about a Chinese century, but I do wonder how it's going to be for my three sons."

Asked whether this century would be more of an "American Century" or more of a "Chinese Century," Americans divide evenly in terms of the economy (41 percent say Chinese, 40 percent American) and tilt toward the Chinese in terms of world affairs (43 percent say Chinese, 38 percent American). A slim majority say the United States will play a diminished role in the world's economy this century, and nearly half see the country's position shrinking in world affairs more generally.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/24/AR201002...

toniD's Ya Think?

should STOP interrupting the President
so he can finish his point. What a fucker.

is saying that polls do NOT support
a health care bill - he is wrong - NO?

PUBLIC OPTION

just askin, because he sure is pulling a lot of nonsense out of it.

I like your last post on the last thread -
most excellent my man!!!

The collective size of the egos in that room is staggering....

If they can keep this from devolving into an all out shouting match by days end I will be amazed...

who woulda thunk that all we have to do is tort reform. the only waste going on here is our time listening to this asshat.

This is a typical Chicago term. I believe in the North East it is Yous Guys.

Obama always uses "You Guys".

------

That Gallup poll McConnell mentioned was a telephone poll of 1009 people. That's what Gallup presented. But where were these 1009 people? Were they called in one area or region or was it from across the nation? Go to the Gallup link to see the breakdowns but it doesn't show the questions, how they were asked, and again, where the calls were made.

Americans Tilt Against Health Care Plan
Gallup: "Americans are skeptical that lawmakers will agree on a new healthcare bill at Thursday's bipartisan healthcare summit in Washington, D.C. If an agreement is not reached, Americans by a 49% to 42% margin oppose rather than favor Congress passing a healthcare bill similar to the one proposed by President Obama and Democrats in the House and Senate. By a larger 52% to 39% margin, Americans also oppose the Democrats in the Senate using a reconciliation procedure to avoid a possible Republican filibuster and pass a bill by a simple majority vote."

http://www.gallup.com/poll/126191/Americans-Tilt-Against-Democrats-Plans...

toniD's Ya Think?

cent - McCain is number 1 on that list

are you against a socialist takeover of your healthcare?

do you think the marxists in congress should get to choose who your doctor is?

i have consistently heard that at best tort reform can have a 1 percent impact on the cost of healthcare with the tradeoff being that individuals would lose their right to be compensated for malpractice.

and yet, this republican was just allowed to claim that tort reform would have a 15% impact on cost and nobody challenged him.

i say its time to start throwing chairs.

that Geraldo episode marks the beginning of the collapse of American civil society in my book...historians will mark it as a sign post of the end of our ascent as a nation...

Senate Leaders setting debate rules in 2025..."Knives or chains"

Japanese death trucks put down stray animals on the move

Gas-chamber-on-wheels scheme introduced after Tokushima residents said they did not want animals destroyed near them

A local council in Japan has adopted a new method of dealing with stray dogs and cats: mobile extermination vehicles equipped with pet-sized gas chambers.

The so-called death trucks were introduced after residents of Tokushima prefecture, in south-west Japan, said they did not want abandoned animals destroyed in their neighbourhood.

The council's solution was to put the unwanted animals to sleep while they are transported to a regional crematorium, ensuring they are dead on arrival.

Dogs and cats marked for death are shut inside sealed metal boxes termed "sedation equipment" measuring 1.2 metres wide, 1.2 metres high and 1.5 metres deep, officials told Japan's Asahi Shimbun newspaper.

Once the eight-tonne truck is on the road, the driver pushes a button that releases carbon dioxide into the boxes, the paper reported. The journey to the regional crematorium takes about one hour. By the time the truck arrives, the animals are said to be dead....
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/feb/25/japan-stray-animal-death-tru...

Women's groups nationwide were outraged by Knight's comments during an April, 1988 interview with Connie Chung in which he said, "I think that if rape is inevitable, relax and enjoy it." Knight's comment was in reference to an Indiana basketball game in which he felt the referees were making poor calls against the Hoosiers.

To repeat, the CBO found that premiums go down under health-care reform

Commentary on the Congressional Budget Office report showing that a given health-care insurance policy will become cheaper under reform has gotten a bit confused. Fox News, for instance, summarized the report as saying, ‘CBO: HC Overhaul Likely Won’t Bring Private Premiums Down.’ Let's assume good faith here, as this stuff is confusing.

First, the bottom line of the report is simple: The CBO says premiums will go down for the vast majority of Americans, and that the same insurance policy will cost less under reform.

The confusion comes in the CBO's analysis of the individual market, which serves about a tenth of the population. CBO expects prices in the individual market to rise by 10 or 12 percent, an expectation driven entirely by predictions that individuals will purchase policies that are much more comprehensive, and thus somewhat more expensive, then the insurance they can afford now. Then the CBO turns to look at the impact of the subsidies, which will cut premium costs by a bit over 50 percent for a bit over 50 percent of the market.

But as the CBO explains on page five, part of the increase in the type of insurance being purchased is the result of "people’s decisions to purchase more extensive coverage in response to the structure of subsidies." In other words, the change is driven by the subsidies, not offset by them.

To see this more clearly, imagine that the University of Florida decided to give incoming students who receive financial aid an $800 credit to purchase a laptop computer. You'd expect that the average computer purchased by students on financial aid would become a bit more expensive. But that wouldn't be because computers had become more expensive. It would be because people now had money to buy better computers.

So too for health-care reform. Premiums for the same policy in the individual market fall by 14 to 20 percent. But people in the individual market, who are largely low-income, will now have the opportunity to purchase better policies that cover more expenses and provide more security. That's a good thing. It's one of the reasons for health-care reform, in fact. And it is not analogous to health-care insurance becoming more expensive, any more than the fact that I could buy a nicer car after getting a better job suggests that cars are becoming more expensive.

Beyond that, it's important to remember that everyone has begun talking about the individual market results as if they are results for the whole of the health-care system. Sen. Mike Crapo, for instance, said that the CBO showed that Americans would see their premiums increase under reform. That's not even true in a misleadingly technical sense. It's simply false.

The individual market sees costs go up, as people can purchase better insurance at a lower cost. And after subsidies, most people are paying less and getting more than they would absent reform. Meanwhile, the small group and employer markets sees costs go down, and those markets serve more than 150 million Americans, as opposed to the individual market's 32 million customers. So it's not only true that most Americans will see their premiums go down, but it's also true that most Americans will see their premiums go down even if you account for the better insurance plans they'll be purchasing.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2009/12/to_repeat_the_cbo_fo...

toniD's Ya Think?

First of all, he's a crook, 2nd he's a idiot who doesn't know what he's talking about!

toniD's Ya Think?

In the past two weeks C-Klan gave the Teabaggers Convention and the CPAC Convention full covered. Furthermore, they open up the phone lines for comments after speakers. They actually open up an additional line for Teabaggers. In other words, they created 3 lines for conservatives.

But today! C-Klan is not covering the summit. It has been relegated to C-Klan 3.

Now why is dat?

The Morning Plum

* As crucial as today’s summit is, the simple fact is this: Congressional Dem leaders will wake up tomorrow in exactly the same position they were in yesterday — confronting the enormously complex problem of how to pass ambitious health reform themselves.

* It’s a foregone conclusion that no meaningful common ground between Dems and Republicans will be reached today. Indeed, what’s striking is the degree to which Congressional Dems, perhaps uncharacteristically, are drawing a clear line in the sand, vowing to make no significant concessions to the GOP and leaving no doubt that they won’t back off passing comprehensive reform.

* For instance: Congressional Dems are privately warning the White House: Don’t concede too much to Republicans today, and don’t throw them any tort reform bone.

* And: In Playbook, Mike Allen previews the remarks Nancy Pelosi will give today. Key line: “Inaction and incrementalism are simply unacceptable.”

Bottom line: There is no way to reconcile that assertion with what Republicans will be asking Dems to do today: Blow up their proposal and start from scratch. The only thing that today’s summit has a chance of changing is public opionion, and all the participants know it.

* This simple reality already has anonymous Congressional Dems laying the groundwork for a post-summit blame game in which, as always, they’ll continue to blame the president’s lack of leadership for their own lack of leadership. Whine, whine, whine.

* Obama administration officials are pushing back hard on that Wall Street Journal report saying that Obama is preparing a scaled-down Plan B on health care, though they are conceding that such a plan exists. A senior administration official emails:

This proposal was developed because the President wanted to know what the impact would be if he had to go small post-Massachusetts. It’s not where we are.

* Sam Stein has more: “The administration is living and dying with the bill it released this week.” Yep.

* And: Jonathan Cohn makes a compelling case as to why this alleged Plan B won’t happen: It won’t work, either substantively or politically, and more important, Dems know it.

* More public option agonistes: Tom Harkin becomes the latest Senator to tell public option proponents that it’s time to move on, though he hopes to revive it later.

* Relatedly, a random question. Here’s Robert Gibbs, on ABC this morning, per The Note:

“I think there are the votes to pass health care reform, because the American people know the course that we are on is not sustainable.”

How does Gibbs know the votes are there for passing a reform plan via reconciliation without a public option, and not for passing a plan with one?

* And boy does the public opinion picture look grim for Dems. A new Gallup poll finds that a plurality, 49%, opposes them passing the reform proposals if the summit yields no ageement; a majority, 52%, opposes the use of reconciliation to do this.

That leaves Dems with two choices. Either: They give up when the going gets tough, and sit on their thumbs while Republicans attack them for trying to jam an unpopular bill down the public’s throat (which they’ll do anyway) while simultaneously painting them as ineffective and unable to lead.

Or: They pass the bill and hold out confidence in their ability to use persuasion to change the public’s mind about it over time.

All signs indicate that Dems are swallowing hard and opting for the latter.

What else is happening?

http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com/bipartisanship/the-morning-plum-77/

toniD's Ya Think?

Submitted by toniD on Thu, 02/25/2010 - 11:38am.
First of all, he's a crook, 2nd he's a idiot who doesn't know what he's talking about!
------

And we should complain! Why? Because Armstrong Williams settled two law suits for sexually harassing, MEN!

$100,000 Per Year to Lock up a Cheese Thief? The Perverse Logic of "Three Strikes"
That a man with unpaid-for cheese in his underwear could ever have faced essentially the same sentence as Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab is an absurdity.

In an era of savage budget cuts to the most basic of public services, does it make sense for a state to spend $50,000-$100,000 a year to lock up a cheese thief for the rest of his natural life?

The obvious answer to that question would be "no." After all, $100,000 could keep one or two teachers employed; could pay the home-health care costs of disabled low-income Americans; or could keep an after-school program afloat. And yet, that is precisely what a grandstanding California district attorney's office earlier this month suggested was an appropriate solution for the problem that is Robert Ferguson: a mentally ill, drug-addicted 53-year-old habitual offender who has cycled in and out of prison for most of his adult life and found himself on the wrong end of a three strikes prosecution for the monstrous crime of stuffing a $3.99 bag of shredded cheese down his underpants and hot-tailing it out of a Nugget supermarket without paying....
http://www.alternet.org/rights/145766/%24100%2C000_per_year_to_lock_up_a...

NCAA Gives Focus on the Family the Boot After Homophobia Complaints

After trying to reach out to football fans by airing an ad during the Super Bowl, Focus on the Family is now targeting college sports. This week, LGBT blogs reported that NCAA.com was running a Focus on the Family banner advertisement. The site has now pulled the “Celebrate Family. Celebrate Life” ad, citing concerns by NCAA members over Focus on the Family’s homophobic positions:

The NCAA made the decision after some of its members – including faculty and athletic directors – expressed concern that the evangelical group’s stance against gay and lesbian relationships conflicted with the NCAA’s policy of inclusion regardless of sexual orientation,

OFF ON A PREDICTABLE FOOT.... If you're watching the White House health care summit, you may have noticed that Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) has delivered an extremely long opening statement. I can summarize it for those of you who've missed it: "No. No, no, no. We're not willing to compromise on the legislation, and all we want is to kill the Democratic legislation and start over." Imagine about 17 minutes of that, with a bizarre metaphor about a car show and a de Tocqueville quote.

And expect a whole day of it.

At [today's] White House health care summit, lawmakers from both parties will sit down for six hours and, ostensibly, try to come up with a bipartisan compromise. But for the Republicans, only one compromise is acceptable: Scrap the bills we have and start over.

Minority leaders in the House and the Senate have both called for a total do-over, and other members of the Republican contingent are echoing the line.

In an op-ed today, HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and White House Office of Health Reform Director Nancy-Ann DeParle raise a relevant response.

[W]e share the view of Rep. Charles Boustany (R-La.), who said last September: "We agree on about 80 percent of the issues right now. It's just a matter of hashing out those few areas where we disagree."

That's why we think Republicans should find a lot to like in the proposal President Obama released on Monday. It contains several ideas taken directly from Republican bills, such as letting people save on their premiums if they participate in proven employer wellness programs, a proposal supported by Rep. Mike Castle (R-Del.). Or giving states grants to evaluate medical liability models that can improve patient safety, reduce medical errors and bring down liability premiums, similar to a proposal Sen. Mike Enzi (R-Wyo.) has supported. We know Republicans will support the measures to prevent health-care fraud, such as new background checks for Medicare suppliers and real-time reviews of claims, because they're the ones who wrote them.

The president's proposal also contains insurance reforms that Republicans have supported for years. For example, it would eliminate caps on benefits, a step that has been supported by Sen. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.). Republicans including Sens. Tom Coburn (Okla.) and Richard Burr (N.C.) have backed one of the proposal's key elements: state-based, health insurance marketplaces where families will be able to easily compare insurance policies to find the one that's best for them. The president's proposal would also ban discrimination based on preexisting conditions, a change that Coburn and Burr pushed for insurance plans in these new marketplaces.

I've never heard of a set of talks where one side agree with 80% of what the other side is offering, and to take the next step, recommends scraping everything and starting over

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2010_02/022584.php

toniD's Ya Think?

INCREMENTALISM VS. COMPREHENSIVE CHANGE.... On health care, a key GOP talking point, outside concerns over process, is more of a meta observation: "comprehensive" approaches to public policy are fundamentally misguided.

Lamar Alexander has been a leading voice on the Republican side for incrementalism. His argument is that the White House erred by trying to pass such a big, sweeping reform bill, and so Democrats and Republicans should instead get together and pass popular parts of reform, one piece at a time. Analysts have pointed out that many reform ideas don't really work on their own; they have to be passed altogether in order to make the system work.

Right. There are plenty of parts to reform, but they're inter-locking. It's easy to say we'll take some steps now, and leave others for later, but to make it so that those with pre-existing conditions aren't discriminated against, for example, we'll need mandates and subsidies. It's like an engine -- the parts don't work unless they're part of a larger whole.

What's interesting, though, is that Republicans used to understand this -- not in some previous generation, but very recently. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said over the summer that "comprehensive" reform is "long overdue."

Around the same time, Republican Sens. Grassley, Kyl, and Enzi agreed that they support moving on a "comprehensive, inclusive" package.

Republicans have discovered that "comprehensive" is suddenly something to avoid, but they only came to that conclusion after the House and Senate already passed reform.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2010_02/022585.php

toniD's Ya Think?

I've been busy w/ work and could not form a proper response to our last and I consider ongoing, exchange.

To answer the point about why I consider the writer of the following to have an agenda;

"In 1958 it developed high-speed processing equipment for motion pictures that could develop 500 feet of film almost instantly."

For me the source or who "it" is, is not the point. The point is the writer says that the film is developed "almost instantly" in order to support a point they are making. [let's say 'making a point' rather than 'agenda']

I know, from my own experience of my bathroom B&W darkroom, [let's assume the writer is talking a B&W movie] that there are specific time and temperature steps required to develop film. Developer, stop bath, fixer, rinse and dry. These steps take a given amount of time and the high speed process mentioned cannot exceed these minimum times. The process mentioned is, I believe, a technique to get as much of that 500 feet of film through a given bath, within the time and temperature constraints, as quickly as possible. There is nothing "almost instantly" about it.

I am using this as an example of how a writer that is trying to make a point, will choose words and phrases that support their point. I don't recall what that writer's point was right now, I am only trying to show an example that it is very easy to bend the truth to make a point.

~`ordinary's just not good enough today - olp`~
Jamesbenet

Blue Roots Radio

and you get an end zone dance:

My Gift to the Obama Presidency
John Yoo
Though the White House won't want to admit it, Bush lawyers were protecting the executive's power to fight a vigorous war on terror.

.....I did not do this to win any popularity contests, least of all those held in the faculty lounge. I did it to help our president—President Obama, not Bush. Mr. Obama is fighting three wars simultaneously in Iraq, Afghanistan, and against al Qaeda. He will call upon the men and women serving under his command to make choices as hard as the ones we faced. They cannot meet those challenges with clear minds if they believe that a bevy of prosecutors, congressional committees and media critics await them when they return from the battlefield....

Without a vigorous commander-in-chief power at his disposal, Mr. Obama will struggle to win any of these victories. But that is where OPR, playing a junior varsity CIA, wanted to lead us. Ending the Justice Department's ethics witch hunt not only brought an unjust persecution to an end, but it protects the president's constitutional ability to fight the enemies that threaten our nation today.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870418810457508347353707984...

Stocks in U.S. Tumble on Greek Debt Concerns, Drop in Durable-Goods Orders
U.S. stocks fell, sending the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index to its biggest drop in three weeks, as Moody’s Investors Service said it may downgrade Greek debt and reports on jobs and manufacturing orders trailed forecasts.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=aBfp7l.Ux1vo

Morgan Stanley's John Mack Says Investment Bankers Still Get Paid Too Much
Morgan Stanley Chairman John Mack said investment bankers are overpaid and Wall Street compensation won’t decrease much because firms don’t want to lose their best performers.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=at1af1WVPaG4

Jobless Claims in U.S. Unexpectedly Increased 22,000 Last Week to 496,000
The number of Americans filing first-time claims for unemployment insurance unexpectedly increased last week, a sign that the economic recovery will be uneven as the labor market struggles to rebound.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601068&sid=acHHvnKPvkxU

Bernanke Says Fed Is Reviewing Goldman Sachs's Arrangements With Greece
Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke said the use of credit default swaps to destabilize a country is “counterproductive,” and added the central bank is reviewing the arrangements of Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and other companies with Greece.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601068&sid=aqg81f2oGWQc

toniD's Ya Think?

I can't stream video at work so I have rely on the kindness of others to give me live news like Jon Walker at FDL

..Live blog of Blair House Boondoggle

it's theater
Submitted by SEDER on Thu, 02/25/2010 - 10:06am.
===
This blog is a theater.
We're all on stage.

=
I'm off to my other one. Later.

~`ordinary's just not good enough today - olp`~
Jamesbenet

Blue Roots Radio

the mispronunciation of nuclear but what recently is bothering me is the mispronunciation of insurance.

Many from the South pronounce it as in-surance.

From Mariam Webster: (n-shrns)

With the emphasis on the shoor

toniD's Ya Think?

"Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me and I welcome their hatred."

President Roosevelt, Madison Square Garden, October 31, 1936

There is an astonishing lack of anger among liberals, progressives and radicals who have abandoned emotion to the right. Our role model continues to be not FDR, still less Malcolm X, but our "bipartisan" and apparently tone-deaf President Obama. In this second or third year of a devastating depression, not just recession, that has inflicted an epidemic of suffering on the lower half of the American nation, Obama is very busy being fluent and civil while being essentially untouched by the rage felt by so many of us. Our world, as we have known it, is being annihilated, and nobody in power shows signs of giving a damn...
http://www.counterpunch.org/sigal02252010.html

ladies and gentleman, i think we have a new definition of chutzpah.

(my favorite used to be the example of a child asking for the court to show them mercy for killing his parents because he was an orphan)

You hear the sound of chairs being dragged back and fourth. I didn't hear that when the Repubs talk.

toniD's Ya Think?

its a lot cheaper to provide health insurance to people who never get sick - sebelius

Good. Because Cantor was showboating! Ass that he is!

toniD's Ya Think?

PBS is not running the (faux) debate, MSNBC & CNN goes mostly back and forth between rethug media folk (usually), split screeen, & the Debate.
Thank You again.

rep. louise slaughter.

what is she talking about?

On February 25,
1964, 22-year-old Cassius Clay shocks the odds-makers by dethroning world heavyweight boxing champ Sonny Liston in a seventh-round technical knockout.

To celebrate winning the world heavyweight title, Clay went to a private party at a Miami hotel that was attended by his friend Malcolm X, an outspoken leader of the African American Muslim group known as the Nation of Islam. Two days later, a markedly more restrained Clay announced he was joining the Nation of Islam

On this date
2000 A jury in Albany, N.Y., acquitted four white New York City police officers of all charges in the shooting death of unarmed African immigrant Amadou Diallo.

{Justice Dept. Won't Pursue Charges in Sean Bell Shooting

NEW YORK, NY February 16, 2010 —The three police officers acquitted of criminal charges in the 2006 shooting of an unarmed black man will not face federal civil rights charges. The U.S. Justice Department says there's not enough evidence to show the officers acted willfully in the death of Sean Bell.}

"not enough evidence." Fifty shots not enough. Perhaps,sixty shots, would've demonstrated that there was a "willful" intent to kill someone.

I NEVER WOULD HAVE HEARD the best woman speaker on Healthcare EVER, in {Rep} Louise Slaughter! I really needed to hear her. Thank You Thank You Thank You

in DC and a bunch of states....seriously.

Here is a HuffPo piece on it.

and one from McClatchy

We had 5-6" of Lake Effect snow last night so they have to plow the parking lot again.

I am soooooo tired of snow!!!! We are already 20' over the average this year. And that was b4 this snow last night.

Enough! Uncle!!! No more please!!!

toniD's Ya Think?

as a pre-existing disease? These insurance companies will find an excuse not to pay any way they can. Bastards!

Where is Michele? Haven't seen her here much lately. Think I'll email her.

toniD's Ya Think?

Please somebody tell Malloy to include in his profanity tutoring sessions with Thom...

that "flying damn" is not idiomatic English (I'm not even gonna Google it; it's just not) and that as a euphemism it just sounds dorky.

(IMO-FU [in a nice way.])

I really thought those white-SHOOTERS would be behind prison gates. Let a few Med Mari... folks out of prison and put those 4 in. Go to Care 2 on "net" perhaps and start a petition?

I remember about that poor gentle, very gentleman being MURDERED. What can be done except to damn the horrid action & MURDERERS & the PD {Police Dept}? What can be done?

Submitted by ghettodefender on Thu, 02/25/2010 - 1:11pm.
where is the anger/ ghettodefender

If the victim was richer and had a better lawyer things might have been different. I also think that Bloomberg explained to the more important players in ths case that the city really coul not afford another judgement/settlement at this time. How he twists people's arms without being directly connected is a skill the uber rich have become very good at.

Because the victim's character could be brought into question and discredited
it became easier to cloud up his believability. Somehow working in a notorious tatoo parlor and admitting to frequent hard drug use didnt help either.====
.

Ghetto justice in ethnic queens is not the same as upper eastside justice

RNC Email, Sent Out Last Night, Concluded Summit Is Certain To Fail

The Republican National Committee appears to have concluded that today’s health summit is certain to fail — before it began.

A reader sends in an email that went out from the RNC to supporters last night at 10:12 PM:

After pledging to listen to Republican ideas at this Thursday’s photo op — er, “bipartisan health care summit,” President Obama has decided to stick with the Senate Democrats’ health care legislation, a bill that Americans have already rejected as a massive restructuring of our economy that is a short walk down the road to government run health care. He’s rejected alternative methods of tackling our health insurance crisis before hearing them. He’s betrayed the American people’s trust.

The text of the full email is here; at the bottom of the actual email it specifies that it’s the work of the RNC.

Now, in fairness, the GOP position for days has been that the summit is all but certain to be a failure. Some Dems have said this, too. And Republicans and Dems alike have been very explicit about the fact that the chances of compromising are slim to nil.

But I’m not sure anyone other than the RNC definitively concluded in advance, on the record, that it was a certain failure.

http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com/republican-national-committee/rnc-emai...

toniD's Ya Think?

LET'S TALK ABOUT PREMIUMS.... The White House's summit is about a third complete -- the first two hours felt like 20 -- but there's one point of contention that's come up repeatedly, so it's worth setting the record straight.

Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) argued, in the Republicans' opening statement, that the CBO found that health care premiums would go up under the Senate Dems' reform plan. President Obama insisted that this wasn't true, and after some back and forth, concluded, "I'm pretty certain that I'm not wrong."

And, he's not wrong at all. Alexander just doesn't understand the issue very well.

Lamar Alexander and Barack Obama just had a contentious exchange on this point, so it's worth settling the issue: Yes, the CBO found health-care reform would reduce premiums. The issue gets confused because it also found that access to subsidies would encourage people to buy more comprehensive insurance, which would mean that the value of their insurance would be higher after reform than before it. But that's not the same as insurance becoming more expensive: The fact that I could buy a nicer car after getting a better job suggests that cars are becoming pricier. The bottom line is that if you're comparing two plans that are exactly the same, costs go down after reform.

You can find a full rundown of the report here.

Let's not forget, though, that the president explained this quite well, and yet, at least three other Republicans -- so far -- have said the Democratic plan would raise premiums.

Now, it's possible that these GOP lawmakers aren't paying attention. Maybe they're lying and hoping we won't know the difference. Perhaps they came with memorized talking points, and weren't able to adapt after reality had been explained.

But it's nevertheless a reminder about why policy discussions with Republicans tend to be pointless. They make claims that aren't true, and after being corrected, repeat those claims again anyway.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2010_02/022587.php

toniD's Ya Think?

You Go First! Democrats Clash Over Reconciliation
Brian Beutler | February 25, 2010, 9:50AM

Democrats finally seem ready to act on health care reform, and for perhaps the first time in the entire year-long health care reform debate, they're speaking--openly--about the likelihood that they'll invoke the budget reconciliation process to make some tweaks to the Senate's health care bill. But there remains no clear path forward, with the House and Senate still jockeying over who will make the first move, and even Senate Democrats divided on how the process should work in their chamber and who among them gets to decide on it.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says she won't pass the Senate bill until the reconciliation process is complete. And Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad (D-ND) says the Senate can't do reconciliation until after the House acts on the Senate bill. Has an unstoppable force just met an immovable object?

Not necessarily.

House and Senate aides privately point out that this is a question being worked out among leadership, and that the decision is not Conrad's to make. And a Senate leadership aide points me to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's statements from yesterday where he said "nothing's off the table" with respect to reconciliation.

Still, Conrad says the question--can the Congress pass a reconciliation bill before the House passes the Senate health care bill?--is his to answer.

"At the end of the day it's the chairman of the Budget Committee's [job]," he told me after a joint House-Senate health care meeting.

He went on to explain his position. He says it's logistically impossible to pass a reconciliation bill, which is meant to amend a separate bill that hasn't passed. "I don't know how you would deal with the scoring, I don't know how I'd be able to look you in the eye and say this package reduces the deficit," he told me.

I asked Conrad why the Congressional Budget Office couldn't treat a reconciliation bill like any other amendment package, and score it together with the Senate bill.

"I don't know the answer to that question."

Admittedly, it's a very abstract question regarding a rare, if not unprecedented, set of procedural circumstances. But the fact that the Senate's top budget guy still doesn't know how leadership plans to proceed is striking, and the sense pervades in the Senate that the House must act first. Sen. Jay Rockefeller also (D-WV) says the House must pass the Senate bill before the reconciliation process touches off. Other Senate Democrats have weighed the possibility of sending the House a letter, signed by 50-plus members, vowing to act on reconciliation if the House enacts the Senate bill first.

http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/02/your-turn-does-the-house-have...

toniD's Ya Think?

Play more Springsteen.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQMqWAiWPMs

Every liberal talker should begin or end their show with 41 Shots.

Submitted by gloryoski on Thu, 02/25/2010 - 1:30pm

doesn't get past the profanity laws on broadcast radio.

-------- Glorioski
I have been driving one of the last Original members of The Buena Vista Social Club. Her name is Omara. WE went to NPR WNYC RADIO NYC with John Shaeffer interviewing and to a very cool WFUV Fm interview With Rita
Houston. it is a 50,00 watt listener sponsored College radio at Fordham University . Omara likes my feeble attempt at Spainish and we speak half and half,both trying to practice our skills. She told me stories of coming to America In 51 and singing with Nat King Cole, Stan Kenton's Big Band and Tito Puente (we called him cheato Plenty) she also worked with Chico Ofarril's big band (sp) which still plays under the son's name Arturo . It is a Rick Ricardo sounding Big Band with Old 50's charts and alot of Jazz solong
The Cubans are very warm and friendly and smart as a whip about politics in America. I am lucky to get to know them..( they used to come here alot but the original band's members are not around(moved on to a better place).?

quite boring and predictable so far

do you guys remember the conyers hearings about the downing street memo, or the senate hearings with george galloway about the iraq war hearing. It was much more fun watching this stuff during the bush years, much more drama there

as long as we're talking about theatre...

if they meant for this thing to be interesting at all

yawn

Koua Fong Lee: 'Toyota Defense' May Free Jailed Minnesota Man

LINO LAKES, Minn. — Ever since his 1996 Toyota Camry shot up an interstate ramp, plowing into the back of an Oldsmobile in a horrific crash that killed three people, Koua Fong Lee insisted he had done everything he could to stop the car.

A jury didn't believe him, and a judge sentenced him to eight years in prison. But now, new revelations of safety problems with Toyotas have Lee pressing to get his case reopened and his freedom restored. Relatives of the victims – who condemned Lee at his sentencing three years ago – now believe he is innocent and are planning to sue Toyota. The prosecutor who sent Lee to prison said he thinks the case merits another look.

"I know 100 percent in my heart that I took my foot off the gas and that I was stepping on the brakes as hard as possible," Lee said in an interview Wednesday at the state prison in Lino Lakes. "When the brakes were looked at and we were told that nothing was wrong with the brakes, I was shocked."

Lee's accident is among a growing number of cases, some long resolved, that are getting new attention since Toyota admitted its problems with sudden acceleration were more extensive than originally believed. Numerous lawsuits involving Toyota accidents have been filed over the recent revelations, and attorneys expect the numbers will climb.

In testimony before Congress, company executive renewed their apologies for underestimating the safety problems but also acknowledged that they still may not have identified all the causes for the sudden acceleration.

The uncertainty could wind up helping Lee and others. Attorneys for both the 32-year-old St. Paul man as well as the victims' families say they're encouraged by the evidence that the problems went beyond models that originally were recalled.

If Lee's car was defective, "We don't want an innocent man sitting in prison," said Phil Carruthers, who prosecuted the case for Ramsey County.

A Toyota spokesman declined to comment on Lee's case.

Lee, a recent Hmong immigrant with only about a year of driving experience, was driving his pregnant wife, 4-year-old daughter, father and brother home from church the afternoon of June 10, 2006, when their Camry zoomed up an Interstate 94 exit ramp in St. Paul. Police said it was traveling between 70 and 90 mph when it rear-ended an Oldsmobile stopped at a red light.
Story continues below

Javis Trice Adams, 33, and his 10-year-old son, Javis Adams Jr., died at the scene. Adams' 6-year-old niece, Devyn Bolton, was paralyzed from the neck down, and died shortly after Lee was convicted. more...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/25/koua-fong-lee-toyota-defe_n_476...

toniD's Ya Think?

where is Bloomberg?

Mayor Michael Bloomberg

"'If we don't prosecute (Plaxico Burress), to the fullest extent of the law, I don't know who on Earth we would,' Bloomberg said. 'It makes a sham, a mockery of the law. And it's pretty hard to argue the guy didn't have a gun and that it wasn't loaded. You've got bullet holes in and out to show that it was there.'

"Burress' attorney, Benjamin Brafman, asked people not to prejudge the case.

"'I think the mayor can at times influence pending legal proceedings,' he said. 'I am just asking the mayor and everyone else to take a deep breath ... [and not prejudge].'

"Bloomberg has made his war on illegal guns a signature issue. He also had harsh words for the hospital where Burress was treated, New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center. He said hospital management should be charged for failing to report the incident, and that the hospital workers involved should be fired.

"'It is just an outrage that the hospital didn't do what they are legally required to do,' he said. 'It's a lame excuse that they didn't know – this is a world-class hospital in a city where we all know what goes on in the streets of our city, and we all should be working together to get guns off the streets.'

The statement "we all should be working together to get guns off the streets" is shockingly immoral and fascist – and laughably impossible, even if it were a lofty goal.

The News Day story continued, "Police didn't learn what had happened until they saw it on the television news Saturday afternoon, several hours after the shooting occurred at a Manhattan nightclub, Bloomberg and police officials said. The mayor also blamed Giants management for failing to notify authorities.

"'The Giants should have picked up the phone right away, as good corporate citizens,' he said.

Quick, somebody add "good corporate citizens" to the list of creepy fascist terms before we forget it.

urress is being prosecuted not for damaging another person's body or property, for which that person has filed a complaint, seeking restitution and/or damages; he's being prosecuted for not having a permission slip from the State to carry his own property. And the people who helped him get medical treatment are being threatened for not turning Burress in to the State for not having a permission slip and because the piece of his property, for which he didn't have a permission slip, involved in the victimless incident happened to be a gun; and for not cooperating with the State, once the non-crime came to its attention, in helping it gather evidence to prosecute Burress for the non-crime, and possibly to prosecute them for their involvement in the non-crime too.
http://www.lewrockwell.com/kramer/kramer22.html

Iran and Syria put on show of unity in alliance Clinton finds 'troubling'

Ahmadinejad and Assad accuse the Americans of trying to dominate Middle East

Clinton said the US wanted Syria "generally to begin to move away from the relationship with Iran, which is so deeply troubling to the region as well as to the United States".
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/feb/25/syria-iran-alliance-clinton-...

is stupid and having a gun law that doesn't allow for the fact that Burress was lisenced in another state and that he did it to himself should be mitigating circumstances I would hope. But Burress is black ball player and Bloomberg wanted to get reelected by being a tough little el duce.

Bloomberg has a big problem with guns coming in from Virginia and I think he should get on those states that aren't careful with how their lack of inforcement causes trouble in other states

Has Rahm Emanuel Become a Liability for the White House?
Lincoln Mitchell
Harriman Institute, Columbia University

Rahm Emanuel has been a controversial appointment from when he was first offered the position of White House Chief of Staff. For many progressive Obama supporters, Emanuel's appointment was the first of many decisions by the White House that were discouraging. It signaled that Obama's commitment to changing things in Washington was not as strong as might have been hoped. Nonetheless, it was generally understood that the appointment of this consummate political insider was necessary for Obama to pass his program. It was also understood by many that concerns about Emanuel's abrasive personality, strong ties to the Clinton era Democratic establishment, work in the finance sector during the years of the Bush administration and general political outlook could be ignored if Emanuel helped Obama succeed in the White House.

Emanuel, however, has not helped Obama succeed in the White House. Other than the initial success of the stimulus bill there have not been many substantial legislative successes from the Obama administration. While it is not reasonable to hold Emanuel entirely responsible for all this, legislative successes are really the only reason why it would be worth it to keep Emanuel around. Emanuel has asserted that the mistakes of the Obama administration have occurred because his advice was not heeded. However, making sure that advice is heeded is part of the job of an advisor or chief of staff. Giving good advice is not all that difficult; turning that advice into action is the hard part.

Ascribing Emanuel's failure to an inability to get his voice heard in the White House is far from the full story. At key moments, Emanuel's advice was loud, clear and wrong. Emanuel's position, in the end of 2009, that Obama needed to pass something on health care so that he could take credit for some success was wrong-headed and may well have been the moment when the presidency was most in danger of unraveling. Urging the White House to cut a deal with, of all people, Joe Lieberman so that they could get a bill was an extraordinary lapse of judgment, one that was not without serious consequences for the White House.

In addition to failing in perhaps the most important part of his job, Emanuel has also become an ongoing news story, and rarely a good one, for the White House. His most recent use of the phrase "f%*#ing retards" to describe liberal Democratic members of congress drew attention because of the offense which Sarah Palin and her supporters took, but it is equally troubling that the chief of staff for a Democratic president would use a phrase like this to describe the base of the party. (This is what I said but was not covered much by the MSM)

During the first 13 months or so of the Obama presidency, Emanuel has rarely been out of the spotlight, beginning with his father's unfortunate comments, but also for his personal style and creative and frequent use of profanities. Not all of Emanuel's media attention has been negative, and some of it is clearly out of his control. He is an interesting and compelling person who seems to naturally draw media attention. Nonetheless, staff members, even chiefs of staff, should have a lower media profile than that.

This, of course, was one of the great strengths of Obama's campaign. David Axelrod and David Plouffe managed to run a brilliant, disciplined, focused and successful campaign without ever becoming the story. The two David's were extraordinary professionals, never causing any problems or bad news stories for the campaign or candidate. The same cannot be said for Emanuel.

While Emanuel cannot be blamed for all the short-comings of the Obama administration, he certainly has contributed to many of the problems. Getting rid of Emanuel might, in the short term, help Obama pursue more effective legislative strategy, but it would also help the president send a message to the country and to his supporters that he understands that something is not right with his presidency. His unwillingness to make a move like this has lent his administration impressive stability, but it has also contributed to the notion that Obama somehow does not care. His calm temperament, which can sometimes make him seem aloof, has exacerbated this perception.

Obviously, a balance has to be struck. The president cannot shake up his administration every time something goes wrong, nor should senior members of the administration be treated as political tools to be dismissed when Obama needs to send a message. Too much instability in the administration will signal a presidency that has lost control and lost its way, but that is not close to being an issue yet for Obama. Emanuel has become a liability on the administration because of his media presence and the stories that surround him, but is not delivering the legislative victories which were the primary rationale for his appointment. It happens that some changes in the administration would send an important message as well. The choice regarding Emanuel, while not easy, should be clear.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lincoln-mitchell/has-rahm-emanuel-become-a...

toniD's Ya Think?

jumping in the pool and all of a sudden my head is spinning and i feel like throwing up

literally

so i don't know if it's the lunch i just ate, some sort of shrimp and corn creamy soup, maybe a little too rich, also maybe already a couple of days' old, who knows

i detest this man; everything he's saying about mandates and the larger pool of course it makes perfect sense but he leaves out the main thing that makes it sensible: the single payer or at a minimum a public option

now he's saying how during the campaign he was against the mandates and now he had to be dragged kicking and screaming to accept them... and i feel like vomiting

can you?

now i'm falling asleep (nausea has subsided, as soon as obama stopped talking, so maybe it wasn't the shrimp soup after all)

Please don't mandate I get in!

i know the freepers all scream that its wrong to have mandates but its a logical part of insuring and providing care for EVERYONE.

the whole gotcha is that without mandates is that people will wait till they need insurance to get insurance. the logical result of that is that the cost of insurance has to be equal to the cost of the care being provided.

the only way to make this work is to have a base level of health insurance provided by and defined by a PUBLIC OPTION.

Listening to Hartmann today--

A caller tried to rally Thom with the idea for using legislation to get rid of ABJECT GREED which pollutes our system. Now, in effect, he was calling for a PARADIGM SHIFT AWAY FROM MATERIALISM AND TOWARD GREATER EMPATHY (which Thom's guest Jeremy Rifkin was addressing in his new book about human empathy).

But I don't think Thom got it, since Thom seemed to be attempting to disprove the efficacy of taking an empathic stand; Thom's solution was the usual tables and charts and tax brackets response without a moral message -- that is, a materialistic response solely. Just "reigning in" ABJECT GREED is not the same as taking a stand to make it economically and socially unnacceptable.

I think I see what the caller was talking about. Uncontrolled Capitalism is ANTI-SOCIALISM; all that caller seemed to want is a SOCIALISM where the participants want a cooperative and empathic response by government reflecting most humans' natural cooperation and caring. Pure Materialism must be replaced with something new. Materialism is the problem, so it cannot also be the cure!

Just was reading last night about how we got locked into our competitive, dog-eat-dog Scientific Materialism Paradigm, and what an eye-opener. It really got me to seeing what a mistake we Liberals and Progressives make when we defend Darwinism as if it were the highpoint of evolutionary Science! Darwinism PROVIDES the scientific justification for ABJECT GREED by the "strongest" in our culture!

All Darwin did was transpose British unfair social class structure to the idea of evolution! Look:

o British class hierarchy indicated that the strong (by blood or money) were deserving of their status

o Darwin was a member of the British upper class

o Darwin struggled for over 20 years to see in his naturalist notes an evolutionary pattern -- without success!

o Then a young naturalist -- a British COMMONER named Wallace who was working in southeast Asia wrote a theory of evolution. It noted that living organisms adapt to the changing environment as the weakest succumb and the rest proceed to evolve.

o Wallace sent his manuscript to Darwin, requesting Darwin's assistance in getting the manuscript published. Darwin esssentially stole Wallace's theory in what is known as the "Delicate Arrangement" (an act which Darwin felt was perfectly acceptable because it was his uppercrust privilege, I guess!) and Darwin REFRAMED Wallace's theory to reflect Darwin's own upperclass worldview: Instead of Wallace's view that the weakest drop away leaving all other organisms to proceed on the evolutionary journey, Darwin reframed this as ONLY the strongest win the evolutionary battle. This was indeed the point of scientific justification for social class dominance and established a further entrenchment (which we cannot shake) of SCIENTIFIC MATERIALISM.

o How different things would be today if Wallace's original ideas had not been overlayed with the existing dominator mindset/worldview!

Progressives should think twice before they defend Darwinism. Please. It is so part and parcel of the Paradigm we need to overcome.

And that caller is on to something that is KEY to the solution -- recognizing ABJECT GREED and preventing its expression. I salute him.

does anyone remember this group from the early sixties?

http://www.last.fm/music/The+Mirettes
an infectious track that needs a vaccine asap.

this was the group I was thinking of

3 former backing singers former backup singers for Ike & Tina Turner, then known as The Ikettes, became The Mirettes from 1966-1970. The Mirettes featured Venetta Fields who left the Ike & Tina Turner revue, along with fellow Ikettes: Jessie Smith and Robbie Montgomery. The trio signed to Mirwood Records and they formed as a way to break out from under Ike Turner’s oppressive thumb. Unfortunately, despite a promising start, they were mired in legal problems, and even bullied and intimidated out of performing by Turner and his allies.

Does anyone know if he was born that way?

I don't want to tease him if he was born retarded.

mandates without public option don't make any sense

if you take the public option off the table because you have to leave health care to the free market but then introduce the mandates that contradict the concept of free market, it's really a monstruosity, taking the worst of both world (the public and the private)

and yet this cool and smart guy doesn't seem to get it, doesn't even pretend to be getting it

don't remember them but here's a link about them:

http://funky16corners.wordpress.com/2006/12/04/the-mirettes-take-me-for-...

(at first i thought you were thinking of the ronettes with ronnie spector)

i think that perhaps the republicans were a lot smarter than we want to give them credit for with their "socialist" "marxist" "government takeover" meme.

obama knows that as soon as he wanders into public option territory, that he will be clubbed senseless by right wing media and the republicans as turning freedom loving america into a socialist europe country.

You are driving OMARA PORTUNDO?!

I am not even going to read the rest right now. Need to FO and it will get me too excited.

Will read the details as a reward for having done scary things like asking on the phone for money. (Not for me.) (I wish.)

Flying fig is an acceptable substitute. Just as dorky, but it's a real expression in English and at least it's alliterative.

:)

fernando, when i read your comment i didn't know the guy you were talking about but since you mentioned him i now paid attention and i see him now shaking his head, talking to this xavier guy, with this idiotic look on his face, so now i have an answer for you, i think he was born that way so you are safe to call him retard, i think

Xavier said do-do in front of the monkeys.

Where did that analogy start?

What the summit looks like to me is a Brotherhood of Corporatists who are trying to get some mileage out of pretending they split into opposites/polarities. Polarity? It is no more than the Brotherhood members bickering over which plan can screw the public longest without the consumers catching on that they are being screwed.

If the Kabuki Theater analogy fits, it is because all the Kabuki actors are men even though some of them act as if they are women... At the summit, all the actors are Corporatists even if they act as if they are not.

Otherwise, I don't really get the Kabuki analogy. Just the sing-song posturing visual? Not enough.

oh jeezus i am starting to feel nauseous again :)

Grassley, not so much.

I want it understood that us Texans feel slighted. Senator John Cornyn is every bit the retard as the rest of them republicans. Why was Texas not invited to show off our ass clown? Don't tell me our republicans can't compete with the rest of these Special Olympians. Hell, Cornyn is good friends with Queen of the Retards, Palin.

i can hardly wait to hear his take

now that will probably be good theatre; jon stewart's too, except i can never catch his daily show (either too early or too late on my schedule)

That wants to give vouvhers for Medicare and put SS into the market. He's a complete idiot and a sneaky bastard.

Grassley still talking about high risk pools.

This mandate is a big problem every which way. and it's not the first time that the country mandated something. Auto Insurance is a mandate.

toniD's Ya Think?

kabuki can be interpreted as "avant-garde" or "bizarre" theatre

case closed.

Submitted by mire on Thu, 02/25/2010 - 2:56pm.
mandates without public option don't make any sense

if you take the public option off the table because you have to leave health care to the free market but then introduce the mandates that contradict the concept of free market, it's really a monstruosity, taking the worst of both world (the public and the private)
...

=================

I haven't seen this put so concisely before. Thank you, Mire!

my guess is that he's busy doing a happy dance right now because he didn't draw the short straw.

yes toni, we talked about this before; the difference is you can choose not to drive a car if you can't afford insurance but you can't choose not to get sick, so the analogy is not totally fair.

at Winona Lake. Rescue attempts are ongoing. - CNN

OMG! I think I see Cornyn there. Prayers going out to his family.

in ohio, we have an additional auto insurance that any sane person carries, called uninsured drivers insurance. it basically provides a policy to cover expenses when you are hit by someone who has no insurance.

do other states have this?

one other thing that ohio does is that you are allowed to post a bond against personal assets in lieu of showing that you have insurance coverage, the idea being that you are pledging that you have enough money set aside to cover paying a claim.

i don't know why it has not been mentioned much that insurance in the context of health care doesn't make sense to begin with - because you can insure risk but health care is not properly a risk, it's something that everyone is going to need at some point or other, it's a human condition, it's very different from a car crash, or a flood or an act of god; you're young and then you're old, you're healthy and then you're sick, some are healthy and some are sick, this is not a risk, so the concept of insurance shouldn't enter into the debate at all

i think rachel was very good last night, making the case that the for-profit system we have here is fundamentally wrong, all this talk at this summit is really a bunch of hoooey

I never said to compare them. Grassley said that the health insurance mandate would be the first.

All I was aluding to is it wouldn't be the first.

I don't like the mandates and never have.

toniD's Ya Think?

Without safeguards, it was a license given to insurance companiesto over-charge. Didn't the state start to provide its own insurance policy program?

http://www.insurance.ca.gov/0100-consumers/0060-information-guides/0010-...

phew, what if it had been a bus full of nuns holding babies?

(From the WEBN Album Project 8, 1983 - "Bus Full Of Nuns" by Dan Barr)

by claiming we have to start over because the bill provides federal funding for abortions and that violates everything that is sacred.

it is all bullshit...if it was really all about "Coverage and Cost Containment" the only discussion they would be having would be exactly how to implement Single Payer...we can't even get them to mention Public Option

When did "cool and smart" become a euphemism for Corporatist Chickenshit?

The insurance industry is laughing at us right now...

I can't believe I missed this:

FL-Sen: Precursor to a switch? Hotlist
by kos
Digg this! Share this on Twitter - FL-Sen: Precursor to a switch?Tweet this submit to reddit Share This
Mon Feb 22, 2010 at 01:16:03 PM PST

"....If he wants to survive in politics, switching is his only hope. What's more, I'd welcome him into my party...."
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2010/2/22/839586/-FL-Sen:-Precursor-to...

Daily Kos founder wants Charlie Crist to run as Democrat against Rubio
http://blogs.creativeloafing.com/dailyloaf/2010/02/24/daily-kos-founder-...

YOu know spray tan is like botox to the brain.

you're making me sick, asshole republicans!

i am so sick of hearing this "our grandchildren will be paying for this"; they never trot the grandchildren about when they discuss the war funding do they? so it's only the health care that damages the children economic future; without health the children have no future period, stupid republicans

Comparing a venerable art form to the venal (open to bribery) behavior of the brotherhood of Corporatists.

when he says its a senate tradition that everything passes with a 60 vote majority?

i've seen lists a yard long of how the republicans with their up or down vote abused recounciliation over and over and over.

Foundation for Economic of economic trends--

http://www.foet.org/

[excerpt]

Major theme areas relate to:

The European Dream: Cross-cultural understandings between Europe and America and the attendant political, social and economic impacts

The Hydrogen Economy: The energy crisis, climate change, and the future in renewable hydrogen technology and infrastructure

The Age of Access: Exploring the economic shift to global commercial networks and its outcomes

The Future of Work: Issues surrounding employment in an increasingly automated, borderless and highly mobile global economy

Science and Technology in the 21st Century: Analysis and critique of developments in the biotechnology, nanotechnology, advanced IT, and the cognitive science fields

[end excerpt]

Without safeguards, it was a license given to insurance companies to over-charge...

You're right.
All insurance should be ended. That's what the real demand and battle should be about. Not Single Payer. But simply ending insurance entirely, and having the government underwrite society's risks.
When the clown Rethugs are screaming about national health care as the road to "socialism" or "communism," they're really right. A low cost, genuine, national health care system, if properly funded, would inevitably lead to the question: 'Why have insurance at all?'

Go Dick Go....

the ones i have are both bastards

I don't like it when normal people beat up on the mentally challenged. Especially in public like this.

Submitted by ghettodefender on Thu, 02/25/2010 - 9:57am.
Really? Once a month Thom gets a radical caller who is advocating violent resistance. Thom always contemptuously dismisses the caller by arguing that violent resistance is futile. Violent resistance, in the face of seemingly overwhelming military power, seems to have worked quite well for the VC. It worked for the mujaheddin against the Soviets. It's working the mujaheddin successors in Central Asia against us. It worked for the Bolsheviks against the Romanov's. It worked for the original guerrillas in Spain against Napoleon. And it worked for the original members of the Boston Tea Party.
-----
Submitted by jbenet on Thu, 02/25/2010 - 11:57am.
...I am only trying to show an example that it is very easy to bend the truth to make a point.
------------------------------
It is a constant temptation to bend the truth to make a point.

Analogies are a good place to find bent truth. ghettodefender has compared the Viet Cong, the mujahideen, the Russian Revolution and angry colonists with violent resistance in modern day America. He lined up disparate and unrelated pieces from history to sell his point.

A major superpower is not going to supply you, the American in violent opposition, with a weapon so that you can move from village to village, briefly joining each village's agrarian commune in exchange for food, water and shelter during your fight against separatists who are supplied weapons by yet another superpower.

A modern-day, violent, American resistance would not be analogous to any of ghettodefender's examples. The U.S.A. has a very complicated, sophisticated and interwoven society. If the Resistance were to plant bombs in roadways or shoot people coming out of corporate or government offices, everyday life for ordinary American citizens would not improve for a very, very long time...if at all.

If you think you and your family have health care problems now, imagine having to navigate your way around hospitals overwhelmed with people wounded in guerrilla attacks.

If you don't like the NSA snooping around on the Internet, imagine being stopped to prove your identification at manned roadblocks between your house and food distribution areas.

If you don't like "corporatism" or "fascism," imagine how quickly agents of commerce would join with agents of governance to crush guerrilla violence and personal rights to privacy.

However you imagine that violent resistance in America would play out, it would not be the black-and-white solution being sold by ghettodefender and nora. It would not quickly and certainly transform American life from "bad now to better after."

ghettodefender and nora will be dead from old age before there is a "better after." It requires at least one generation to heal the wounds from violent upheaval in a society. There is no guarantee that a variation of Leninism won't come out of the other end.

Have a looksee at modern-day Vietnam and Afghanistan and Russia. Do you think the dead resistance members won what they wanted? The Boston Tea Party is a different issue. It is a single-day segment in a long succession of historical happenings. If the Brits had not imposed the Intolerable Acts, the Boston Tea Party could have been forgotten for the ordinary protest that it was.

ghettodefender, before you get your panties in a bunch, here is another meaningless similarity to illustrate how easily it is done:

The governments of Vietnam, Afghanistan, Russia and the U.S.A. are alike because they are all governments.

grading the tests (in this case the republicans' proposals)

did he just say all we have to do is kill off 5% of the people to save 50% of the expenses?

Submitted by dan on Thu, 02/25/2010 - 3:03pm.

i think that perhaps the republicans were a lot smarter than we want to give them credit for with their "socialist" "marxist" "government takeover" meme.

obama knows that as soon as he wanders into public option territory, that he will be clubbed senseless by right wing media and the republicans as turning freedom loving america into a socialist europe country.

__________________

I'd been far less inclined to credit Republicans than I would to fault Obama, who I feel shoulda known better. "Working the refs" is conservative SOP. Hypocritically bitch about bullshit yer (usually) guilty of yerself w/fulsome fake outrage and watch the press stenographers parrot yer "concerns". That's why, imo, our establishment press (which leans right and gives ample coverage to radical right-wing extremists and is governed by the hypocritical IOKIYAR rules) is somehow still known as the "liberal" MSM.

What is so dispiriting about Obama, to me, is that anyone who paid any attention at all (except, apparently Obama) knew -- fucking knew -- that the Republicans would continue their campaign rhetoric into Obama's presidency and continue painting Obama as a "socialist" and "marxist". The conservative pants-pissing was inevitable, as was the media's coddling of transparently crazy people and radical fringers as concerned citizens. Nature of the beast. (Or perhaps mark of the beast, take yer pick.)

But I don't think Obama knew that. I ain't even sure he does now (or perhaps he's painted hisself so far into a corner w/his mulish bipartisanship fetish that he's stubbornly carrying it to its ignoble end).

I think, back in the time was, Obama thought his winning personality and reasonableness in "pre"-compromising (caving) on health care would win the day. I suspect he figgered that by rolling over right at the outset so's to grease the skids to an amicable passage of legislation, even Republicans wouldn't be so shameless as to refuse his preemptive appeasement. Or so Obama, in his vanity (imo), thought. Obama, imo, fell in love w/his own cult-of-personality bullshit.

Instead Republicans, as is their wont to do, took this concilliatory gesture from Obama as weakness and pounced unrelentingly.

So what I continue to fail to grasp is why, if yer gonna get painted as a socialist anyway, why not give these hyperventilating reactionaries something to be genuinely worked up about? Why not go big? Live up (or down, perspective depending) to the "socialist" nightmare these people have fabricated in their minds. It might even work! At minimum it'd be better for negotiations to start big and use the bully pulpit to fight for something people could get fired up about.

Instead you get the worst of both worlds: weak-tea legislation and blame for instituting a "government-takeover" of "the best health-care in the world!"

Jesus, it's so pathetic.

while he's been much more considerate with those republican asses spouting bull crap

showing 68 law-makers were informed about the full expression of the Bush/Cheney TORTURE POLICY as EARLY as 2004:

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE61N0WE20100224

[excerpt]

CIA briefed 68 lawmakers on interrogation program

David Alexander
WASHINGTON

Tue Feb 23, 2010 11:48pm EST

Fri, Feb 19 2010WASHINGTON (Reuters) - CIA officials briefed at least 68 U.S. lawmakers between 2001 and 2007 on enhanced interrogation methods like simulated drowning that were being considered or used against captured al Qaeda members, according to declassified documents released on Tuesday.

[end excerpt]

obama chastising waxman
Submitted by mire on Thu, 02/25/2010 - 4:11pm.
while he's been much more considerate with those republican asses spouting bull crap

============================

Regressives peck on Obama and Obama pecks on Dems/Liberals/Progressives?

Peter Roskam. who is talking now is my District Rep.

toniD's Ya Think?

case closed

Making The Illogical Leap
Submitted by Crank Bait on Thu, 02/25/2010 - 3:50pm.

...

If you don't like "corporatism" or "fascism," imagine how quickly agents of commerce would join with agents of governance to crush guerrilla violence and personal rights to privacy.

...

However you imagine that violent resistance in America would play out, it would not be the black-and-white solution being sold by ghettodefender and nora. It would not quickly and certainly transform American life from "bad now to better after."

ghettodefender and nora will be dead from old age before there is a "better after." It requires at least one generation to heal the wounds from violent upheaval in a society. There is no guarantee that a variation of Leninism won't come out of the other end.

...

============================

Open up your Open Mic about it, Crank Bait, because it would be good to talk about it without upsetting the CURRENT EVENTS thread.

Maybe over THERE you can sort out for us how YOUR PERSONAL BRAND of 'conspiracy' is somehow the ONLY acceptable sort of conspiracy to contemplate.

(You and dr are on the same schedule, again.)

Submitted by nora on Thu, 02/25/2010 - 4:32pm.

... Maybe over THERE you can sort out for us how YOUR PERSONAL BRAND of 'conspiracy' is somehow the ONLY acceptable sort of conspiracy to contemplate.

(You and dr are on the same schedule, again.)

_________________________

Look, I'm a big enough asshole all on my own w/o yer insistent efforts to league me into disputes that are not my own. You know, like this one.

As a deep personal favor to me, nora, is it possible for you to refrain from entwining me in whatever rancor you are feeling?

Especially when I have played no part in it?

Or is that asking too much?

than McConnell has in his whole state...

Nicely done Charles...

Founder of Bob's Red Mill Natural Foods transfers business to employees

By Dana Tims, The Oregonian

MILWAUKIE – Scores of employees gathered to help Bob Moore celebrate his 81st birthday this week at the company that bears his name, Bob's Red Mill Natural Foods.

Moore, whose mutual loves of healthy eating and old-world technologies spawned an internationally distributed line of products, responded with a gift of his own -- the whole company. The Employee Stock Ownership Plan Moore unveiled means that his 209 employees now own the place and its 400 offerings of stone-ground flours, cereals and bread mixes ...

Politics Driving Young Away From Religion
Millennials less likely to belong to a faith; conservatives blamed

(Newser) – Young people are turning their backs on religion, with a whopping one in four 18- to 29-year-olds unaffiliated with any particular faith, according to a recent Pew study of the so-called “Millennial” generation. Yet the number who say they believe in god or pray frequently is similar to past generations of young people. It’s not lack of faith that’s driving them out of churches, it’s politics, writes Jeffrey Weiss at Politics Daily.

Harvard professor Robert Putnam and Notre Dame professor David Campbell make that argument in their upcoming book on religion. The Millennials are a strongly left-leaning generation, and their "religious disaffection is largely due to discomfort with religiosity having been tied to conservative politics,” they write. A 2002 Berkley study found similar things happening with moderates in the 1990s. But Putnam and Campbell think the trend is reversible—provided some religious institutions without political ties reach out to the generation.

http://www.newser.com/story/81794/politics-driving-young-away-from-relig...

toniD's Ya Think?

I guess I was just thinking outloud through my finger tapping.

No offense intended.

leave the grandchildren out of it
Submitted by mire on Thu, 02/25/2010 - 3:38pm.

you're making me sick, asshole republicans!

------
Pot...Kettle...Jessayin'. ;)

Have a great afternoon.

Later

toniD's Ya Think?

but no one has the nerve to call him Barack?

"The Great Cincinnatus" is spinning in his grave....

Rest in peace George...

here you go

more grandchildren. Enjoy!

Not one hundred percent sure which one of two of you that is...

But in any case if you can remember at all where this links
(call in show?) can you please let me know?

Googling the entire first sentence is not gettin' it for me.

Maybe site doesn't exist anymore...

Or will try other search engines.

And, if applicable, please try to remember it is for "the Lord" and not for "the/an asshole" (and they are not one in the same in this case.) :}

==============
Here's you another Federalist Society Friendly Fascist
Submitted by Thespian Lipsti... on Sat, 06/28/2008 - 1:33am.

Joseph Smith

Mr. Smith is a partner in the Denver office of Bartlit Beck Herman Palenchar & Scott LLP. He earned his undergraduate degree from Yale College, cum laude and with Distinction in the Philosophy Major. He earned his law degree from the University of Chicago, where he was a Bradley Fellow in Law and Government, president of the Federalist Society, and chairman of the Edmund Burke Society. Mr. Smith served as Colorado's Deputy Attorney General for Natural Resources in 1997-98, and was a Republican candidate for Colorado Attorney General in 1998. In 2000, he was among the Bartlit Beck lawyers who represented George W. Bush and Dick Cheney in connection with the Bush v. Gore trial in Florida. Mr. Smith is an alumnus of both the American Council on Germany’s Young Leader Conference, and the U.S. Department of Defense’s Joint Civilian Orientation Conference. Mr. Smith sits on the Board of Trustees of the Independence Institute, a free-market think tank located in Golden, Colorado. He previously co-chaired the Professional Liability Litigation Committee of the American Bar Association's Section of Litigation.
-------------------------------------------------

I heard this schmuck on a Catholic call-in show a few nights ago. Smith argues that separation of church and state is a modern myth. Back in the day, the conception was "No national church". Side project.
*TLL*

Watch your ass, tz.

(JK) (Seriously)

(I'm sure Omara is not like THAT.

-----
VERY CUTE MIRE

*FON*

http://www.earthjustice.org/news/press/2010/coal-ash-waste-conatmination...

[excerpt]

Coal Ash Waste Contamination Study - 31 New Water Pollution Cases
Sites found in 14 states, significantly increasing pressure on OMB to release delayed EPA rule

February 24, 2010

Washington, DC -- The case for the federal Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to stop sitting on a delayed Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) coal-ash site contamination rule is even stronger than it first appeared to be, according to a major new report from the Environmental Integrity Project (EIP) and Earthjustice. The analysis by EIP and Earthjustice identifies 31 additional coal-ash contamination sites in 14 states, which, when added to the 70 in the EPA's justification for the pending rule, brings the total of coal-fired power plant waste storage sites with poisoned water to 101.

With data showing arsenic and other toxic metal levels in contaminated water at some coal-ash disposal sites at up to 1,450 times federally permissible levels, the EIP/Earthjustice report identifies 31 coal-ash waste sites where groundwater, wetlands, creeks, or rivers have been polluted with "wastes (that) contain some of the earth's most deadly pollutants, including arsenic, cadmium, lead, selenium, and other toxic metals that can cause cancer and neurological harm (in humans) or poison fish." The 31 sites are located in the following 14 states: Delaware (1); Florida (3); Illinois (1); Indiana (2); Maryland (1); Michigan (1); Montana (1); Nevada (1); New Mexico (1); North Carolina (6); Pennsylvania (6); South Carolina (3); Tennessee (2); and West Virginia (2).

U.S. coal-fired power plants generate nearly 140 million tons of fly ash, scrubber sludge, and other combustion wastes every year. The EPA has indicated that coal ash dumps significantly increase risks to both people and wildlife. For example, EPA's 2007 risk assessment estimated that up to one in 50 residents living near certain wet ash ponds could get cancer due to arsenic contamination of drinking water.

[end excerpt]

http://bit.ly/bpihmm

I think mmmaybe I forgot I found that when I went looking for mmmmore.

(Sorry to disturb.)

and we don't need to kowtow to the thugs anymore, now is the time to get a vote on the public option...

The Progressives needs to turn it up and start making demands...

No "Change" in sight.

http://www.cqpolitics.com/wmspage.cfm?docID=cqmidday-000003299173

[excerpt]

Congress Ready To Extend Key Patriot Act Provisions

The House was poised Thursday to send President Obama a one-year extension of several controversial anti-terrorism authorities that lapse at the end of this month.

The bill, which the Senate passed by voice vote yesterday, extends three provisions of the Patriot Act that were set to expire at the end of 2009 but were extended in December until Feb. 28.

Neither House nor Senate Democratic leaders have shown any appetite for tackling a substantive rewrite of the law right now, given all the other issues on their plates.

One of the provisions to be renewed for a year allows the government to seek orders from a special federal court for “any tangible thing” that it says is related to a terrorism investigation. Another allows the government to seek court orders for “roving” wiretaps on terrorism suspects who shift their modes of communication.

The third provision allows the government to apply to the special court for surveillance orders involving suspected “lone wolf” terrorists who do not necessarily have ties to a larger organization. The provision applies only to individuals who are not U.S. citizens, legal immigrants or residents.

The House was expected to pass the extensions by a wide margin later Thursday.

[end excerpt]

Tuesday, Feb 23, 2010 09:24 EST
Inside the mind of Newsweek on "terrorism"
By Glenn Greenwald
On so many levels, this is one of the most stunningly revealing things I've read in quite some time. As I documented last week, the media's reluctance to describe IRS attacker Joe Stack as a "terrorist" reveals that this term has little to do with the act itself and everything to do with the demographic attributes of the actor: namely, in the American political lexicon, "Terrorists" are Muslims who dislike the U.S., while Americans -- especially ones who are white and non-Muslim -- cannot, by definition, qualify. Anyone who has doubts about that or who thought my argument was hyperbole should click on that link, which will direct you to an internal discussion among Newsweek editors and writers over their reluctance to use the term "Terrorist" to describe Stack and who they believe qualifies instead.

Continue Reading
Aside from the suffocating denseness of their discussion -- most of them ramble on about who is and is not a "Terrorist" for three straight days without even attempting to define what that term means -- just look at how blatantly tribalistic and propagnadistic they are about its usage. Many of them all but say outright that it can apply only to Muslims but never non-Muslim Americans. The whole thing has to be read to be believed -- and what's most amazing is that they published it because they obviously though it was some sort of probing, intelligent discussion which would enlighten the public -- but let's just examine a few of the contributions. First, here's the question posed to the group by Newsweek Editor Devin Gordon:

We've been having a discussion over here about the aversion so far to calling the Austin Tax Wacko a terrorist - or as the Wall St Journal called him "the tax protester." And I'm wondering if anyone has read yet - or would tackle themselves - a thorough comparison between our ho-hum reaction to a guy who successfully crashed a plane into a government building versus the media's full-throated insanity over the underpants bomber, who didn't hurt anyone but himself.

This is the first answer, from Managing Editor Kathy Jones:

Did the label terrorist ever successfully stick to McVeigh? Or the Unabomber? Or any of the IRS bombers in our violence list?

Here is my handy guide:

Lone wolfish American attacker who sees gov't as threat to personal freedom: bomber, tax protester, survivalist, separatist

Group of Americans bombing/kidnapping to protest U.S. policies on war/poverty/personal freedom/ - radical left-wing movement, right-wing separatists

All foreign groups or foreign individuals bombing/shooting to protest American gov't: terrorists.
Read more here:
http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/index.html

...the corporate media?

big progressive push is called for but will it materialize?

I'm still reelin' over Sen. Rockefellers reversal.

http://boldprogressives.org/

:):( I agree... I was just suggesting perhaps 41 "emails" or 41 letters or... ;).

rockefeller very briefly, just to dismiss it (yes, a good idea but we are not going to get it, so...) and Pelosi a little more in detail, actually with a hopeful tone, hinting that maybe just maybe the idea is not totally dead because just following her statement, it is the best idea to do everything that is proposed here and more

I've spent the last 3 days following this woman's Twitter feed from just a few followers to her getting ABC News to bring a camera crew to her house and her doing multiple interviews for all sorts of blogs today.

This girl is a fucking pro-choice trooper and has an amazing attitude!

Angie Jackson Live-Tweets Her Abortion on Twitter

"Angie Jackson says nothing is off-limits on Twitter, not even the details of her abortion.
Angie Jackson says she's tweeting her abortion to help other women.

Already the mother of a 4-year-old son with special needs, Jackson, who lives in Tampa, Fla., with her boyfriend, said that after a difficult and life-threatening first pregnancy her doctors advised her to not get pregnant again."

"this machine kills fascists"

which I saw last night. :(
Thank You Jeff F.

Today KAREL estimated the number of denied healthcare deaths and number of health-related bankruptcies that happened while the lawmakers at the Summit protected the insurance industry's PROFITS:

123 deaths and 1,700 bankruptcies

i don't know why it has not been mentioned much that insurance in the context of health care doesn't make sense to begin with - because you can insure risk but health care is not properly a risk, it's something that everyone is going to need at some point or other, it's a human condition, it's very different from a car crash, or a flood or an act of god; you're young and then you're old, you're healthy and then you're sick, some are healthy and some are sick, this is not a risk, so the concept of insurance shouldn't enter into the debate at all ~

obama chastising waxman
new
Submitted by mire on Thu, 02/25/2010 - 4:11pm.

while he's been much more considerate with those republican asses spouting bull crap

leave the grandchildren out of it
new
Submitted by mire on Thu, 02/25/2010 - 3:38pm.

Obama did mention the nasty,dirty words of
"Public Option" I heard it with me own ears.

The Democratic Party has lost the thread of its own narrative. Instead of positioning itself as the friend and ally of the working and middle classes against the power and privilege of exploiters, the party has allowed its opponents to portray it as being openly in the service of powerful elites, e.g. "Talibankers," and naively in the service of powerless "elites," e.g. "welfare cheats." In this Tea Party/Republican narrative, Democrats are depicted as feeding and favoring both the "fat cats" on Wall Street and the "fat poor" on Main Street.

http://www.truthout.org/push-back-democrats57175

Everything you need to stay healthy

vs

Limitless Profits for Insurance Companies

----------------------

I just learned that my friend put off going to the doctor for his earache because he didn't have healthcare coverage. He now just learned he has 75% hearing loss in that ear. THAT is what Obama and friends were NOT talking about today!

All they talked about was how to CUT DOMESTIC PROGRAMS so they can assure the Insurance Industry can keep its PROFITEERING advantages. Everything they talked about -- preesxisting conditions, premium costs, etcetera -- these things would never be issues if we had a NOT-FOR-PROFIT Healthcare System. (I appreciate that KAREL made this so clear today on his show. He said they talked about For-Profit INSURANCE today, but not about healthcare and what it means for real people.)

Will "web 2.0" Change Abortion Too?

"not 24 hours after we read about Angie, I came across another woman doing the same thing: live-tweeting her medication abortion. She's just begun it. I also saw some kind of creepy twitter people messaging her every other minute trying to change her mind: "puke [the pills] up. please puke them up. i'll adopt your child. please save your child." I am not making this up. So the notion of Web 2.0 has been on my mind: it's revolutionizing everything else, so why not abortion?"

"this machine kills fascists"

http://www.samsedershow.com/node/5676#comment-397482

Odierno requests more combat forces in Iraq -- beyond the Obama deadline

In a move that could force President Obama to break his vow to get all combat troops out of Iraq by August of this year, his top commander in Iraq recently officially requested keeping a combat brigade in the northern part of the country beyond that deadline, three people close to the situation said Wednesday.....

.......This debate is just beginning. I expect that Obama actually is going to have to break his promises on Iraq and keep a fairly large force in Iraq, but of course that won't be the first time he's had to depart from his campaign rhetoric on this war.

Speaking of which, CNAS, the little think tank that could, plans today to post a report (Update: now posted) by me titled The Burden about the way forward in Iraq. It argues that we need to think about keeping troops there for many years, not because I think it is a good answer, but because I think it is the least bad one.

Let's open the betting: How many U.S. military personnel will be in Iraq four years from today--that is, Feb. 25, 2014? The person who guesses closest gets a signed copy of any of my books. My guess: 28,895. Not "combat" troops, of course! Goodness no. Just "advisory" troops who carry M-16s and call in airstrikes and such.
http://ricks.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2010/02/25/odierno_requests_more_co...